1893.] on the Becent Solar Eclipse. 147 



safely stowed, was groping her way amongst the shallows and banks 

 of the Salum down to the sea. The memory of our green-canvassed 

 structures and of the strange instruments of brass and iron with 

 which we English sought to shoot the moon for trying to eat up the 

 sun has now doubtless become one of the traditions of the Wolofs 

 and Sereres of Fundium. 



M. Deslandres, I am happy to say, was not less successful. In a 

 communication which he has just made to the French Academy 

 he gives a brief account of some of the main results he has 

 gathered from the photographs which he was able to take. His 

 instrumental equipment enabled him to obtain photographs of the 

 corona, to study its spectrum, to examine the coronal light in the 

 most refrangible part of the ultra-violet, and to measure the rotation 

 of the corona by the method of displacement of the lines in its spec- 

 trum. His coronal photographs showed luminous jets of a length 

 equal to twice the diameter of the sun, while the general form was 

 similar to that usually observed at times of maximum sun-spot 

 frequency. The spectrum photographs have revealed the existence 

 of at least fifteen new coronal and chromospheric lines. But the 

 most novel of M. Deslandres's observations relate to the rotation of 

 the corona. His negatives showed the spectra of two points on 

 exactly opposite sides of the corona, situated in the equatorial plane 

 of the sun, at a distance equal to two-thirds of his diameter. The 

 lines in the spectra indicated large displacements, and from the 

 measurements, M. Deslandres concludes that the corona must travel 

 nearly with the disc in its motion, and thus be subject to its perio- 

 dical rotational movement. 



M. Bigourdan, who had been stationed at Joal, on the coast of 

 Senegal, since December last, for the purpose of observing southern 

 nebulas and making pendulum observations, was commissioned 

 by the Bureau des Longitudes to search during the eclipse for the 

 inter-mercurial planet which Leverrier assumed to exist, and which 

 he named Vulcan. M. Bigourdan was also requested to make 

 careful determinations of all the four contacts, with a view of 

 obtaining additional data for correcting the tables of the motion of 

 the sun and moon. 



As regards Vulcan, M. Bigourdan was not more successful than 

 his predecessors, but he determined with great accuracy the time of 

 the total phase at Joal, which he found to be 4 min. 1 sec. My own 

 observations at Fundium, which is about as much to the south of 

 the probable central line as Joal is to the north, gave 4 min. 3 sec. 

 as the time of totality, which is in very fair accord with M. Bigour- 

 dan's determination. M. Coculesco, a young Roumanian astronomer, 

 who volunteered to accompany M. Deslandres to Fundium, found 

 4 min. 11 sec. 



As yet we have only meagre information of the results obtained 

 by other observers. In spite of the many chances against them, 

 Mr. Taylor and Mr. Shackleton were successful at Para Curu. 



l 2 



